Jul 04, 2024
OHIO University Undergraduate Catalog 2023-2024

SOC 4700 - Sociology of Gender


This course explores the social and cultural construction of gender as a fundamental basis of social relations and institutions and narratives we tell about those interpersonal relations and institutions. Focus includes sociological theories of gender, and an examination of gender in areas such as sexuality, identity, the body, education, marriage, family, violence, health, paid and unpaid work, popular culture, politics, and the history of the discipline itself.

Requisites: 6 hrs in SOC or WGSS
Credit Hours: 3
OHIO BRICKS Bridge: Diversity and Practice
Repeat/Retake Information: May be retaken two times excluding withdrawals, but only last course taken counts.
Lecture/Lab Hours: 3.0 lecture
Grades: Eligible Grades: A-F,WP,WF,WN,FN,AU,I
Learning Outcomes:
  • Students will be able to explain sociological theories of gender and how they differ from biological, psychological, and economic perspectives.
  • Students will be able to critically discuss gender as a system of power and inequality.
  • Students will be able to critically discuss how gender is socially constructed and performed.
  • Students will be able to identify how race, class, sexuality, place, and other identity categories intersect with gender.
  • Students will be able to discuss how social institutions and everyday practices maintain and reproduce gender ideologies and gender inequality.
  • Students will be able to critically discuss how gender creates power imbalances in people’s personal relationships.
  • Students will be able to articulate their own assumptions about gender and how social constructions of gender have influenced their own lives.
  • Students will be able to describe cultural differences in verbal and non-verbal communication of other groups and use culturally sensitive communication with others.
  • Students will be able to discuss how their own lived experience compares to that of other groups.
  • Students will be able to identify and critically assess contemporary media portrayals of gender.
  • Students will be able to apply knowledge about gender to their everyday interactions and in support of culturally different others while suspending judgment.
  • Students will be able to identify and discuss social and political movements to change gender inequalities and gender practices.


Add to Portfolio (opens a new window)